Throughout the centuries, rodents such as rats and mice have thrived among human civilizations. Rodents have been responsible for damage to property and the spread of infectious disease to humans and animals alike. In response, traps have been used by land owners and the pest extermination industry to exterminate rodents for more than one hundred years. Conventional means of rodent extermination include: snap traps, electronic traps, glue traps, VICTOR™ “Live Catch” traps, ultrasonic traps, magnetic traps, chemical repellents and poisons.
Snap traps include conventional mousetraps or “Quick Set” traps by VICTOR™. A traditional snap trap comprises a base with retaining means comprising a locking bar, wire bail and bait petal. The bail is retained in a set position by a locking bar that is released when the bait petal is triggered. The advantage of these snap traps are that they are inexpensive to manufacture, effective at killing rodents, and can be used in any environment. However, in the past they have been baited with perishable bait to attract the rodents. Moreover, the bait used must be sticky enough to ensure the rodent will disturb the trigger mechanism even when the animal touches the bait only lightly to prevent the rodent from feeding on the bait without being trapped. Further, the perishable bait can be difficult and time consuming to attach to the bait petal. In addition, most bait is temperature sensitive and can decompose before entrapment.
Electric or electronic traps include a plastic encasement with a pair of electrodes to detect the rodent and dispatch high voltage shock when activated, for example U.S. Pat. No. 5,949,636 to Johnson et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 6,735,899 to Anderson et al. These traps require the user insert bait through a bottom hole on the back plate with a plastic or wooden knife. The user must be sure to allow enough of the bait to extend through the entrance hole, since rodents are very cautious and generally need to sample the bait before entering into the internal encasement. This provides the rodents the opportunity to extract the bait without ever entering the trap. Additionally, the construction of these types of traps make the removal of unused perishable bait difficult.
Glue traps are paper or cardboard covered in a non-drying strong adhesive to entrap mice or rats, see U.S. Pat. No. 5,477,636 to Musket and U.S. Pat. No. 5,384,981 to Cohen. These traps are economical and easy to set, however they typically utilize grain such as wheat for bait. Grains may sour under damp conditions causing odors that are unacceptable for indoor use.
Numerous chemical control means have been employed to encapsulate chemical rodenticides to mask odors and/or taste. However, these poisons have several major drawbacks. Once chemically poisoned, a rodent may die and decompose in an inaccessible place, such as inside a wall, creating a possible odor problem or additional infestation. Moreover, a few species and strains of rodents will detect and avoid the chemical odor and others are resistant all together. Sometimes, household pets become the victims of these chemical control means. Still yet extensive precautions must be taken by the exterminator to prevent poisoning of himself during distribution of the chemicals.
Accordingly, what is lacking in the art is a safe effective and non-toxic animal trap bait that can be easily applied to new as well as pre-existing animal traps. The animal trap bait should be non-perishable, reusable and disposable by conventional means.